The selection of applets provides a quick download of the application,
which runs on your machine which provides scalability and the use of inexpensive
file server, and therefore without the burden of expensive computing intensive
hardware and associated server software. The low cost is essential to maintain
a free site in the face of the current dot com meltdown.

Applets also provide another very important feature: rapid software
update. When you hit the site your browser cache, assuming you have set up the
browser cache, will be compared with the class files on the server, and if there
is a difference the browser will download the latest files. This makes application
deployment and updating easy and ensures that you have all of the latest files and
do not encounter problems analagous to the .dll clash issue with the desktop. And
don't worry if you have not set up a cache on your browser, the browser will then
always download the latest class files.

The downside of using applets is some time, usually seconds, involved in
downloading class files and launching the Java Virtual Machine (JVM), but I believe
that this is a good trade-off for the low cost and deployment assurance offered by
applets.

JavaScript is also used on this site to open additional HTML windows (see
the Two-Phase Flow Applet). Information is passed from the Java applet to JavaScript using
the URL as outlined in Réal Gagnon's site
http://www.rgagnon.com/howto.html. Click on the "Javascript interaction" link on
Réal's site for the details.